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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29756964">they'll talk about us, all the lovers</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/writingandwinter/pseuds/writingandwinter'>writingandwinter</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Arranged Marriage, Best of Wives and Best of Women, Dark Zuko (Avatar), Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Extremely Dubious Consent, F/M, Infidelity, Katara (Avatar) Needs a Hug, Mai(Avatar) Needs A Hug, Political Alliances, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, Zutara, anti-Zutara, each nation uses one universal language and also their own personal nations, had this idea before i finished the show so it won't be quite canon compliant, katara is the fire lady and mai is the mistress, maiko, morally confused zuko, not a zutara fic, please read Authors note, pro katara, pro mai, semi-happy ending</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 23:21:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,464</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29756964</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/writingandwinter/pseuds/writingandwinter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“You know I love you. You know I had to do this. I’m the Fire Lord, the nation needed this.”</p><p>“Did you assume I would stay and be your.. I’m your mistress. I want to go, let me go.”</p><p>“I would perish without you beloved, you know we need you here.”</p><p>A chord of pity struck the Fire Lady as she listened to their conversation. Perhaps this was not the passionate love affair she imagined it to be. Perhaps she did not relish in destroying her marriage. Perhaps she was just as miserable.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aang/Katara (Avatar), Katara &amp; Mai (Avatar), Mai/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Suki (Avatar)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>52</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>they'll talk about us, all the lovers</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hi! This story is not quite canon-compliant and features an OOC Zuko. It has a semi-happy ending for two(or maybe three) people! It includes emotional and physical infidelity so if that's not your thing... </p><p>I was inspired by writing a paper for English class on the role of wives in royal families and all that a marriage can mean- politically or personally. The prologue does not really give dates/years/etc. as it is more of one character's thoughts and feelings on everything. Additionally, this is not anti-katara or anti-mai at all, even if it seems that way in the beginning!! Also, this is NOT a zutara story</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She had not wanted any of this. The engagement, the wedding, the marriage. She saw his eyes linger towards <em>her</em> as they ate their meals. She was the one he wanted. She accepted long ago that Fire Lord Zuko’s heart belonged to another woman.</p><p>Before their wedding, as she walked through the halls of her new house(never a home, home didn’t exist anymore, not in the same way as it did Before Everything) she heard them behind the hallway with the plum wallpaper.</p><p>“I love you, I love you, I love you my beloved, I don’t want her,” her husband-to-be said with no respect for who may be listening.</p><p>She ignored the crackling in her heart because this was a marriage for the sake of peace. Her thoughts, her <em>feelings</em>, had no space in this unity. Especially when her future husband’s heart belonged to another. Especially then.</p><p>She whispered fervently, "You need to try. I won’t let myself be… I’m not <em>one of those women</em>. Please just let me go.”</p><p>She imagined that the woman’s eyes were filled with as much anger as her voice. To carry that much unbridled rage was dangerous for a woman of her position.</p><p>Fabric rustled against each other and there was a muffled moan as the smacking of lips slowly increased in volume. There was no regard for anyone else in this place. Nobody cared that she may hear her fiancé and his… <em>whore</em> going at it.</p><p>“Just give me one year with you here, please, you’re so smart. After you can have any job in any nation. Please you can help us change for the better I know you can.”</p><p>There’s a pause and she silently prays to the gods to make her say no. Don’t let her stay. Make her leave the Fire Nation and run to wherever she wants to call home. She’s ruined enough for them, please make her leave before she destroys what little there is to build.</p><p>They don’t listen to her desperate pleas. For after several moments of suffering silence and quiet kisses to what she assumes is her face, there is a soft, “One year.”</p><p>She never imagined she could sound so quiet. She’s come to associate her voice with entitlement and a sense of all knowing that only one<em> so intelligent, brave, and strong</em>(according to her fiancé who sung her praises to his court) could possess. Maybe she means it. Maybe she truly does not want to be ‘one of those women.’ Maybe she will respect the sanctity of marriage- even if neither party eagerly awaits the wedding day- and stay back.</p><p>The promise was empty. She spent her wedding night alone in her room, as the Fire Lord has no desire to share with her. It was not said outright, but the pitying stare and gentle voice from Aiko, one of her ladies- in- waiting tells her everything. As does the sight of <em>her</em> leaving his chambers early the next morning, hair rumpled and eyes red-rimmed with her clothes from the night before still on. She did not mean it.</p><p>Nor did Zuko’s promise of giving her any job. Each month after the first year a request is submitted for jobs across the world, each dealing with politics. Each one is denied.</p><p>The woman, surprisingly, or maybe unsurprisingly, was a master at politics. She sat at Zuko’s right hand, <em>not his wife, not the Fire Lady</em>, and spun ideas for the future of the nation from her mind to their wallets. While she captured the attention of every man in that room, whether positively or negatively, her husband's eyes followed every movement she made. A raised right hand and his eyes would trail her ring-covered fingers all the way to the burgundy sleeve of her advisor robes.</p><p>She was the first and only female advisor and everyone pretended not to know why. At first, they practiced indiscretion with their affair. Over time their daily exchanges of handing off papers and lingering touches led to escaping the nation on the same days for trips to Ember Island. <em>And everyone knew.</em></p><p>What stung more than their lack of respect for her, was her power. She opened her mouth and the ideas that spilled out were passed with no question. No matter how extravagant or miniscule of a law or bill she deemed a pressing matter, it was always signed by the Fire Lord with full support.</p><p>The praises, the praises for this woman were never expected. Wasn’t <em>she</em> the Fire Lady? Wasn’t <em>she</em> his wife? Wasn’t it <em>her</em> job to stand up and speak of laws and ideas and changes? Wasn’t <em>she</em> supposed to sleep in his bed each night?</p><p>
  <em>That advisor, the girl, she’s brilliant.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I heard she has the Fire Lord in her back pocket, in more ways than one.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Makes sense, they had a thing in the war I remember.</em>
</p><p>Everyone knew. Everyone knew he loved her and she loved him and she was the evil Fire Lady who kept the lovers separate. As if Zuko had not agreed to the marriage. <em>This was what was best for peace, everyone said. You two will grow to love each other.</em></p><p>They did not grow to love each other. It was not for lack of effort on her end. Every touch to his muscular arms, every attempt to fix his collar, even asking to play a game of Pai Sho- they were always refuted. The worst part was- <em>he</em> would stare at her with eyes crinkled with guilt and bite his lip as if he was the one who was hurt.<br/>
Then he would run off to <em>her</em> at any time of day as she was always there, always waiting.</p><p>It got worse once they found his mother. The moment Ursa, Ikem and Kiyi arrived, their relationship that never began was officially over. Ursa took one look at her, the Fire Lady, and raised her eyebrows and sent a sad smile her way before directing her attention to his advisor. She had no place in this family; she was not the one her son loved.</p><p>So she read in the library about the four nations and their history and wished not for the first time, Roku killed Sozin. If he had none of their paths would never have crossed and she would be far away.</p><p>It was terribly lonely as the Fire Lady. She tried to write her friends and family to inform them of her life but the words never made their way on the page. They were busy with their own lives, she could not subject them to the boringness of her own. They wouldn’t care anyways. They fell into <em>her</em> trap. They would not even know how to help. They were all so entangled into their careers they had not seen each other since her pathetic wedding day in a kimono that looked wrong on her and hair that did not match hers and jewelry that seemed to weigh as much as a hundred boulders and would drown her in the ocean.</p><p>So the days passed as his advisor sat on his right side at his right hand and his right hand always caressed her thigh under the table at meetings because<em> who cared if the Fire Lady saw at this point</em>. The nights passed even slower, with her alone in her room, and him down the hall with <em>her</em>.</p><p>Sometimes if she sat so quietly, she could almost hear them. Logically it was impossible for her to hear their moans crescendo to the point they burst through walls into her practically empty bedroom to taunt her and her perpetual loneliness. At first, she did not care that she had never been touched. Yet after all these years as she was older she knew what she wanted, what she <em>craved</em>, and would never get. Nobody cared she too had a love interest once upon a time, her feelings had no merit.</p><p>Life was not fair. That’s what she told herself every morning as she had her curly hair wrangled into a topknot with a crown that felt too heavy on her head, ate foods far too spicy than anything she ever had at home, and watched Zuko watch his sleek-haired, slim advisor who wore a knife ring with the Fire Nation ruby jewel in the center walk the halls of the palace with his sister and their best friend and listened as they all spoke formal fire and ignored her presence. She whispered to herself in the dialect of her home each night in her room as she imagined snowy days and penguin sledding and her mother, who was murdered by the very people who now <em>should</em> call her Fire Lady.</p><p>Katara was <em>exhausted</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Also- I will update my other WIP soon but I remembered this idea I had watching the show before I finished it and I just had to write this! Thank you!!<br/>Also, you can find me on tumblr: fruittartsandknives</p></blockquote></div></div>
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